U.S. Pat. No. 4,001,742 entitled "Circuit Breaker Having Improved Operating Mechanism" describes a circuit breaker capable of interrupting several thousand amperes of circuit current at several hundred volts potential. As described therein, the operating mechanism is in the form of a pair of powerful operating springs that are restrained from separating the circuit breaker contacts by means of a latching system. Once the operating mechanism has responded to separate the contacts, the operating springs must be recharged to supply sufficient motive force to the movable contact arms that carry the contacts.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,424,701, entitled "Operating Mechanism for High Ampere-Rated Circuit Breakers", describes an operating mechanism capable of immediately resetting the circuit breaker operating mechanism to reclose the contacts without having to recharge the circuit breaker operating springs immediately after opening the circuit breaker contacts.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,486,667, entitled "Rating Module Unit for High Ampere-Rated Circuit Breaker", describes a circuit breaker closing spring modular unit whereby the circuit breaker operating springs are contained within a separate unit from the operating mechanism, and can be installed within the circuit breaker enclosure without disturbing the operating assembly.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,489,755, entitled "Handle Operator Assembly for High Ampere-Rated Circuit Breaker", describes a handle operator unit capable of generating large spring charging force by means of an externally-accessible manually-operated handle. A ratchet and pawl assembly allows the manually-applied charging forces to be applied to the operating springs. Once the circuit breaker operating mechanism closing springs are fully-charged, some means must be employed to release the pawl to allow the closing springs to become fully operational.
British Provisional Application No. P87,407, filed Mar. 17, 1995, entitled "Closing Arrangement for High Ampere-Rated Circuit Breakers", describes an arrangement capable of releasing the fully charged closing springs.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/315,385, filed Sep. 30, 1994, entitled "Interlock for High Ampere-Rated Circuit Breaker Closing Springs", describes a closing spring interlock arrangement, which provides a method to interlock the closing springs to insure that the closing springs are released only at the appropriate time.
U.S. patent application Ser. No. 08/220,382, filed Mar. 30, 1994, entitled "A Motor Operator Interface Unit for High Ampere-Rated Circuit Breakers", describes a simplified arrangement of an electric motor mechanism to automatically charge the circuit breaker closing springs.